Here comes Peter ...

Cottontail.......

and gosh darn we didn't see him.

So we're traveling along route 70 and 17 in northern NC today, on our way to VA, I asked Rick if he wanted to sing easter songs (what are easter songs anyway??) or easter hymns (like either of us knows any) or christmas songs or bar songs ~ like 99 bottles of beer on the wall (or 99 bottles of something, somewhere) and he declined ALL of the above ... is that because he's heard me attempt to "sing" in the shower??

Anyway, we left (with very mixed emotions) Newport, NC, and Connorland, to make our way to DC,  (because I've never  been there ~ in case you haven't read that chapter about three dozen times?).  The Moose Lodge in Newport (where we stayed) had great RV hookups and a very warm, welcoming Lodge.

We are headed to a very over priced (read location, location, location) "campground" in Maryland, but we need a couple "down days" in between to do major laundry and a MAJOR cleanup of the coach ...so here we are.

Word has it (thank you Chester for the dope slap) that it's been a few days (4)  since a post.  I am working on photos for a "decent" post - I've loaded about 250 photos (and narrowed it to approximately 85) from the last week.

Stay tuned - I maybe wide awake and capable in the morning ... or maybe tomorrow evening ..?.?.?.?.

Now it's time for pistachio pudding, a shower and snoring and drooling .......

An opinion survey ...

With no pictures......

So keep in mind I have never been to Washington, DC .... we are headed there next week .... AND being joined by my Elisha niece  (can't wait) ... Rick and Elisha have both been there, I haven't.   

Survey says ..... what would be YOUR priorities in DC?   Seems no one comments on the blog, so please either comment here or email me/us .. tpw0607@gmail.com   or   rjwhd95@aol.com    

Thanks all .....

Connorland

It's about Connor to start this post.  

Connor had his tonsils and adenoids out yesterday, as well as tubes put in his ears (like his father had many many times when he was young ... it was sort of an annual occurrence for Joshua way back when).  

Things are very different in hospitals these days than way back in "our day" (as we realized when Paige Elizabeth L. Whelan was born).  The photo above is Joshua, Trisha and Connor waiting for Connor to go into the OR.  Connor could have been transported in a red wagon but chose to be carried!  The Curious George he is holding (which later was being tossed between Connor and I) was given to him by the nursing staff when he arrived.  

The procedure went well and we were with "the kids" for a few hours a while ago and you would never know that Connor had anything out of the ordinary done yesterday!  Gosh to be a kid and have that resilience!  He is such a fun little boy, but WOW does he have energy and trying to keep him "calm" (per doctors orders) appears to be very challenging!  THAT is why "young people" have children right?!? 

Trish's parents ~ Larry and Sheila ~ are here staying with the kids.  We all got together at our place for a cook out on Sunday.  We also celebrated Connor's fourth birthday (how the heck is he four already), because neither Larry, Sheila, Rick or Grammie were with him this year on March 8th to celebrate his birthday (yes Grammie had real guilt issues with it, but I guess it was inevitable that it happen some year).  He is eating his birthday cake above.  It got chilly and windy outside so we brought the cake and ice cream inside for the celebration, and Grammie forgot (UGH) to buy balloons!

Connor spent lots of time running, playing and riding his bicycle while they were here. Another form of entertainment was the "challenges" Rick would put forth for him.  It was so fun to watch.  Some challenges involved climbing, some walking on narrow planks and the best (which I unfortunately don't have a photo of) was Connor walking on the see saw ... Rick did explain to him, of course, what was going to happen when he got to the middle ... Connor loved loved loved all these "challenges" ~ how Rick ever dreams this up is beyond me, but I sure wish I had this creativity and patience when I was raising two boys ...  The photo above was one of the challenges, but I don't know what it was all about (check out the "tattoos" on Connors legs ~ there are several on both arms) ... the boy just cracks me up with his tattoos ... he used to call them "taptoos" and when we were in Sioux Falls working at the fair there were several vendors there who gave away "temporary taptoos" so of course Grammie gathered many for Connor. 

In front of where the coach is parked someone has mounted a flag on a huge NC pine tree ... Connor demonstrated his "Pledge of Allegiance" skills for us ... Trisha said she had no idea he even knew it and she and Connor had passed a flag some time ago and Connor was telling her about the Pledge of Allegiance and proceeded to recite it ~ learned it at daycare I guess!  

Above and below are photos of other activities that fun cook out afternoon - see saw with Trish and horse shoes with Trish and Joshua (as well as Larry and Sheila) ... I don't remember, however, who won the game!

I sure had a great afternoon ~ and hope everyone else did as well ... it's so good to spend time with the Lovett/Davis group.

Anyway, with all that said .... we are here in Newport, NC for a few more days anyway (trying to figure our next stop (more on that later).  

We left Huntington Beach State Park last Friday (April 3).  Our intent was to stay at the Croatan National Forest (that link is to a post from our stay here last year - I think I did four posts from there) campground where we were last October ~ which we loved.  However, you can not make reservations at that park and the National Forest website seems to be lacking updated information ... can you tell where I'm going with this?  

To get to that terrific campground you come off the main road (route 70) and travel about a mile to the gate of the National Forest.  As we were headed down the mile long road to the "park" I asked Rick "what the heck was that sign back there that something was closed"....  Well when we got to the end of the road, also the entrance to the campground/park the gate was closed and appeared to be locked with a sign saying they were cutting trees and hoped to be open by the 17th of April.  Well we knew from our stay and chats with the campground host last year that tree cutting was planned for the three months the park was closed over the "winter"...  Keep in mind that we are 68 feet ... backing up when you come to a closed/locked gate isn't really an option (in the year and a half we've been fortunate enough to be living this life, it's only been an issue once before ~ when the flipping GPS really did bad!  Well we managed to work ourselves out of it the first time and we did last week as well.  I decided to "check" the gate .. one padlock was locked, one wasn't.  I don't usually do things like how I proceeded but there really weren't a lot of options ... I took the lock off (the lock that only appeared to be locked ~ and yes I did feel very threatened by the signs that threatened arrest for tampering and trespassing) so we could proceed to what we knew was a great turn around area further down in one of the parking lots for the beach area.

We usually try to have a "plan b", not always, but we try.  Thankfully we did this time.  We ended up at the Moose Lodge in Newport, NC - about 15 miles from where we thought we'd be, which is about eight miles east of "the kids" rather than eight miles west at the National Forest.  This is a terrific, fabulous, awesome, wonderful lodge "camping" area.  Lots of open area for Sir to frolic in as well as water and electric with a dump station (the National Forest had electric but not water at the site) and less than a third of the price.  

Isn't is strange how things usually just work out?  It's been quite a learning curve, but Rick has tried and tried to instill that logic in me .... I'm trying to accept it!

Wildlife at the state park

I think I mentioned the other day that we are Huntington Beach State Park in Murrells Inlet, SC (15 or 20 miles south of Myrtle Beach).  We've been here a couple times before and really love the peace and quiet here (although it was very busy over the weekend with families). Arlo gets to play in the ocean (unfortunately he tends to drink a lot of it which causes problems a few hours later!)

In posts of our prior visits here I noted that this is also a "wildlife viewing area".  When you come into the park you have to go over a causeway to the camping area.  One side appears to be a salt water marsh, the other, I believe, is fresh water where these guys live!

The previous times we've been here we've not seen many gators ~ this time there a several ... including the guy above whom I saw on Saturday.  He was huge ... the rest are much "smaller" in comparison.  I haven't seen him since then, but he was in that same spot all day long.

The photo below is of two guys (or is it three?) hanging out on a rock that has had a gator on it the entire time we've been here.  

These photos, unfortunately, don't show it but there is a sidewalk on either side of this causeway with a couple viewing areas on each.  When we've been here in the past there has been a photographer here (obviously professional) every day, all day long.  He isn't here this time though.  The first and second photo do show the piers that you can walk out on ~ one on either side of the causeway, but a distance away, for wildlife viewing.  Not to mention the ocean and beach just beyond the campground.  Candy and Kimberly you would love it here.

Arlo and I are preparing to have a "campfire".  Rick is out on his bike for a while and before it gets really chilly Arlo and I will be out there.   Often times in the area surrounding campgrounds there will be someone selling firewood in front of their home - we have not been able to find anyone this time and Rick has strong objections to buying a bundle of wood wrapped in plastic at the grocery store .... I decided to check the wood bin in the coach and darn if there wasn't some wood there ... I think from our stay in a great National Forest campground in North Carolina ~ same one we will hopefully be able to get into next week when we visit Josh, Trish and Connor (Connor is have a little surgery on Monday and Grammie and Rick "need" to be there).  Unfortunately that campground doesn't take reservations and we are planning to go in on a Friday ~ UGH ~ I've been trying to get a back up plan in order but it hasn't happened yet!  There is a KOA in the area, but something about spending $60/night on a campsite just doesn't work well with me anymore!  We will save the KOA for when we are in Middleboro in June I think.

Georgia to South Carolina

As I mentioned in the previous post (hey what's up with this - two posts in as many days .. I think, and this time it didn't take several days to upload photos ... will miracles never cease!), we left GA on Tuesday.

One thing I noticed in GA, on interstate 16, other than the darned cement roads (bump bump bump bump) was that at the beginning of exit ramps, and the end of on ramps they had these gates (photo above).  We had seen them in SD or MN and I assumed (!!!) that they were to close off the interstate during major snowstorms.  In GA's case I can't quite imagine the purpose. Can anyone help me with this one?  As for the cement road - Kimberly you would have definitely needed your Dramamine for them - it was pretty awful.

Also, in the previous post, I mentioned I had some photos of Charleston, SC.  As many of you may know Rick and I are not particularly fond of heights - read huge bridges, among other things.  There is a humongous new bridge in Charleston that we were trying to avoid.  On the map it appeared that if we took route 526 around Charleston we would avoid the bridge as well as any others.  Well not so much - above was only one of the ones we encountered trying to avoid the one in the photo below.  The two links I just listed have some really interesting information - Chad and Chester, I think you two will enjoy the read!

So the plan to avoid the huge bridge was a good one, just didn't work out as planned!

Below are several cranes along the waterfront in Charleston.  

Rick and I were in Charleston last November and really really enjoyed our afternoon there.  I would like to have spent some more time there this visit to SC but it isn't going to happen and when we leave Murrells Inlet we will be headed north (Charleston is south of here so...).

Along route 17 just north of Charleston (aka the "low country") there are several shacks (some stands, but mostly shacks) selling sea grass baskets.  Usually the women sit there weaving the baskets.  I remember seeing these stands years ago when I was down here for my oldest son's graduation from Parris Island (I think it was 1996).  That trip we flew into Myrtle Beach and rented a car and drove down to Parris Island then came back up to Myrtle Beach so Joshua could have a little fun - something he probably hadn't had a lot of over the previous ten weeks! It was interesting to see all these places in this different lifetime .... I had forgotten that I went the same route back then that Rick and I did in November and then just this week!

It is gross and humid here the last couple days ... not terrific when you put hot flashes in there as well!  Now we are waiting for major rain to come in for the next couple days, as well as tornado warnings for tonight.  UGH .........  should be interesting - hopefully that's all, just interesting!

Let there be photos!

After three days of trying to upload a bunch (15) of photos it finally was successful with five of them so I won't push my luck.  

We are now at Huntington Beach State Park in Murrells Inlet, SC.  We left GA on Tuesday and will be here until the 3rd of April (I think is the date we leave).  Before we left GA I spent some time at the Botanical Garden in Statesboro (it is part of Southern Georgia University).  What a great, peaceful time it was.  I took lots and lots of photos but here a only a few of springtime in GA (and they certainly aren't the best I took but ......)

Below is a photo of springtime in Vermont ~ baby sister's beloved boiling sap!  So John/Kim does that mean it's also mud season in Vermont?  What a great photo Kim ... I can almost smell the syrup!  

Below, two more random shots of the botanical garden.

I took photos along the way on Tuesday and will try to get them posted - a couple good ones of Charleston, SC waterfront.

rainy thursday in SC

I am still, after three days trying to upload photos .... got some good ones ..... guess you'll have to trust me ....  I think today I will be in pursuit of a different blog provider (again).....